Saturday, May 30, 2009

Limiting yourself

I enjoy reading theonlinephotographer.com. His articles are usually interesting and not in the ordinary scheme of online photo sites.

Mike has started what has become a series of three posts on learning by limiting yourself; here is the original post. His concept, which is fundamentally solid is to buy a Leica M6 body and any one lens you like and shoot nothing but it with B&W film for an entire year.

I agree that using automated cameras with zoom lenses has impinged on the ability to learn how to use a camera. I started out with a Nikon F and quickly graduated to an F2A. I almost always used my 24mm f2.8 or my 85 f2 on that body. The others just sat in my (Domke) bag. To this day 30 years later I can still visualize what a 24 and an 85mm FOV is. And, I have a good built in light meter. I'm usually within a stop (at 400 ASA) of many scenes. Do I think I'm in any way special. No. How did I get this ability? Just repetition. Many years worth of shooting a manual exposure/manual focus camera with Tri-X and 2 lenses.

So, read Mike Johnston's three posts and the reader comments. Give some thought to it. I think I'm going to peruse KEH's listings for F2As. I'm feeling an urge.